And here a game that gets lots of hatred from racing fans, and I have to ask myself - why?
A lot of people claim it looked worse than The Crew from 2014, however, that is not true. Indeed, sadly thanks to the large amount of content the damage system and the details were forced to regress, but other than that it does not look worse at all. Actually the engine used is different and therefore, while the first The Crew had pretty dirty and Need for Speed styled graphics, the ones here a lot smoother and brighter.
Also,compared to the first game, The Crew 2 has way more liberty to offer, since in the 2014 one you pretty much were bound to the missions. Now you have lots of freedom to explore America, also thanks to the fact you not only have cars now, but also planes and boats. So I'm glad Ubisoft (also the developers of Assassins Creed, Watch Dogs and Rayman) have made that move
Story:
Now, there isn't much story in here. If you liked escaping from the cops in TC1, you may be disappointed, because here you don't fight against the law. But honestly, I'm glad this was changed because we don't need another Need for Speed lol.
Now your goal is to become a sucessfull race driver in four different racing families: the street racing family, the offroad family, the freestyle family and the pro racing family. Each of them has four type of serious and in the end you drive against a boss. You win money by scoring Top 3 results. Also, you score new fans too to improve your level.
I just find strange that no matter whether you finished 1st, 2nd and 3rd, you always get the same amount of money. Most people never critisized, but I just find it... strange.
The cutscenes are pretty good and not half as bad as critics said. It's a racing game and obviously not focused that much on story. Your main assistent is your mechanic hero, who will accompany you in every racing family. The families itself also show that they are there for a reason, you see your boss and your family members. Of course there coulda been done more, but I am happy with what they already offer.
Controls and physics: the controls are extremely solid with a PS4 controller, the only thing that bothers me is that ya can't rewind like in FH4. So if you crash, you may have to restart. And if you miss a checkpoint, you'll be disqualified. And if you are stuck on the map outside the races, you may have to change your vehicle.
I just wish you could kick down trees and crash barriers like in FH4. That sadly ain't the case here. You just stop there. Yikes. Other than that however, luckily the controls are solid enough.
Disciplines:
I honestly saw people complaining and complaining about the way the events were made. But honestly, they were miles better than in the Crew 1 and also better than in Forza Horizon 4. But let's go through it one by one. You of course can access the events by driving (or flying) there, but you don't have to, as soon as you unlock em, you also can simply access em on the map.
Now for the disciplines/series itself:
Street Racing Motorsport:
Street Race: Definitely the main discipline, with street races you already know from Need for Speed, Burnout Paradise, LA Midnight Club, Test Drive, Forza Horizon and the like. You drive in a city like NYC, LA, Las Vegas or Detroit and while the the amount of distance is always shown in %, you usually drive two laps. You however don't always drive in cities, but also point to point races on the countryside, and I've realized the races within a city are way harder than the city races, and I don't know why. At least it's the way I experience it, and I also the races to be easier with a bike than with a car. Overall I would say it's more fun than in NfS, and that means a lot considering it's only one of 16 types of racing now! It can be frustrating on some tracks tho if you do not have the right car (or it isn't upgraded enough). In general the races are less easy than in other racing games, especially since you can't switch difficulty.
Drift: The cars you use are usually similar to street racing cars, but they are more focused on drifting. Drifting in this game isn't that hard, nevertheless frustration can easily come up here thanks to the fact that you must avoid touching the walls as long as possible. Your missing is to score a particular amount of points within the time given (usually two minutes). Your amount of points will rise until you stop drifting, or touch a wall. Then your points will be added and you can drift again, but you'll lose time if you don't try to drift long enough. For me it took a long time to get into the groove of things, since many tracks are pretty difficult (like LA Harbor), while others are less difficult, but require more points within the few time (such as Jersey City Circuit). Here, it is immediate performance that matters! It can be annoying, but at least you can strengthen your concentration. So overall fun, but extremely intense.
Drag Race: Sadly the same thing can't be said here. Again, you race with street racing cars tuned to something else. And how do you put a drag race into a racing game anyways? Well, right before the race starts, a meter appears, which you have to get into the green bar. Getting a perfect burn is already more than hard enough, but when you start, the real struggle begins. Of course you must shit, but that is not enough. The meter reappears and you CONSTANTLY need to reach the green bar to stand a chance. OK, it isn't that long and can be done, but it needs PERFECTION and the fact that something where you have to press a button at the right time into a racing game is not good at all. It just doesn't fit. That however doesn't mean it wasn't fun to drive with those cars outside the races. Actually, I did reach 327.5 mp/h at the Bonneville Salt Flats! But overall this discipline is rather here for the sake of variety. I would have cut it out.
Hyper Cars: Well, honestly I don't like hypercars much, they look ugly, but boy, is it fun driving with them! Usually here the races are similar to the street racing ones, but usually the distances for the point to point races are WAY longer. As an example, there is a race from New York City to San Francisco! Of course here it doesn't take two days like it would in real life, only 40 minutes, but it still is extremely intense and messing up. Surprisingly, here the city races are easier.
Offroad Motorsport:
Rally Raid: Sadly, too few games still offer rally raid. Only a few like Gravel do. Here there are two types two. Races in which have to beat a certain time and races in which race against others (there are way fewer of the latter tho). In the latter category you can lose track tho considering there are no borders (only checkpoints) and all eight drivers can easily race wheel to wheel which each others. So overall this is one of my favorite disciplines, if not the best.
Motocross: Yes, there are bikes in rally raid too. But motocross, as we all know, is yet another story. I must admit I don't have got the spirit of Heinz Kinigadner, Tim Gajser, Tony Carolino or Travis Pastrana. But nevertheless, the tracks are tons of fun, whether they are on normal tracks or out in the wilderness (or even in cities). They are not realistic considering you can't fall from the bikes, but let's not forget The Crew 2 ain't a simulation.
Rallycross: Also one of my favorites, considering how much I have grown into rallycross. The Dirt games have brought rallycross from Europe to America, and many other games like V Rally, Project Cars 2 or Gravel have adadpted it too. And honestly, I don't wanna know what racing would be without rally cross. You either drive on stadiums or out in the mountains, woods and desert. In every case it's fun to race and yeah, it is similar to Dirt, but with a The Crew style of racing, and overall they work great together.
Hover Craft: While I first had struggles to control the hovercrafts, I soon I got into em and started getting Top-3's and even winning races. Now since you can drive both on land and water, you experience two different types of driving during one race what alone makes it fascinating. (I realized many of you folks didn't like em, BUT WHY? They are something unique!)
Freestyle Motorsport:
Jetsprint: Those boats honestly are lots of fun since you can drift extremely well with them. The disciplines usually aren't competeting against other drivers, but beating a certain time, which is a bit easier than I thought it would be, but in every case, lots of fun!
Aerobatics: Sadly it ain't like that here. Flying itself is loads of fun, but doing loopings can be EXTREMELY intense and many times they aren't recognized. It can be done, but requites lots of concentration. In general the flying disciplines ain't that fun. The planes are rather good for exploring.
Monster Trucks: This however was one thing everyone complained about, but I love it! Unlike for drifting and the hovercrafts, I got into em instantly. Here you need to score the points you find on the maps, which also requires lots of stunts. It's really hard to explain the feeling driving a monster truck. Try it for yourself first haha.
Demolition Derby: While being very unknown in Europe, in America many fans love this type of sport and I think I can understand why. Honestly, it's very similar to the Mario Kart battle courses, you gotta crash others on the area out to gain points, but beware of getting destroyed yourself, if your car is totally damaged, you'll lose points too. Overall pretty much fun, even though it may not be for everyone.
Pro Racing Motorsport:
Power Boat Racing: Sadly they are way more complicated than the other boat disciplines. Drifting doesn't work, you gotta pray the waves are on your side and choosing the best path is mandatory. Of course you can reach the Top-3 with em too, but it is EXTREMELY intense and not half as much fun as the jet sprint.
Air Race: Also just as complicated as aerobatics, here you gotta beat certain time and hit EVERY chick point of the way. If you not just simply match it, but also match it perfectly, you got one second as a bonus, but if you miss it, you get one second too - however as a penalty. So precision is mandatory and that just isn't my cup of tea. Like I said, I prefer having the planes outsie the missions.
Touring Cars: This one however is one of the best disciplines (along with Rally Cross and Rally Raid). And like in the street and rally raid races, you not only race with cars, but also with (super)bikes and the care itself too already show lots of variety, from European and American touring cars to the old Mercedes-Benz W196 from 1953.
Alpha GP: The last discipline and another one of the highlights since you here you compete with open wheel racer, even including two F1 cars from Red Bull Racing. It's kinda amazing that here the cars have a better feeling than in Codemaster's F1 games. If only real F1 was like that too... well, it once used to be... of course, there is no such thing as pit stops, but other than that the turbo gives you more fun than it already has, and that in Max Verstappen's RB...
So overall, while not all disciplines can't convince equally, for the most part they are lots of fun and no racing game in history has ever provided that much variety. So despite all the frustrations, I am more than satisfied and can live perfectly with the mistakes, even though some maybe can't. Depends on how much you like things like monster trucks and jetsprints.
Map: the map shows a lot of overview over America, of course not perfectly, but many. I just wish we will also have cities like Philadelphia and Indianapolis one day, those are sadly still missing. But other than that, we do have the most important parts of America, such as Manhattan, Las Vegas, the Rocky Mountains, Lake Michigan, Mount Washington etc.
Cars:
Unlike in The Crew 1, the cars do have an order, every car (except for the helicoper) falls under one of the 16 main categories. I just don't like the concept with the drifting and dag cars. Honestly, couldn't they have just made an option to turn street racing into drift cars. But well, why should I complain? Overall in every category, there's a decent amount of cars, like already said, Red Bull in the Alpha GP category, Mercedes W196 and NASCAR Chevrolet Silverado in touring cars, Chevy Camaro in street racing, KTM in motocross, Kris Meeke's Citroen C3 in rallycross and and and...
Music:
The title song is already nice, but like in Forza Horizon, the music that plays during play comes from one of eight radio stations. Here however, they don't have an DJ's which perhaps is better so that you can listen to music nonstep.
I think the most popular is a rock station, that focuses a lot on hard and indie ruck. I prefer it way over the Horizon XS station from FH4, it has less punk and more hard rock. The perhaps most popular songs are "Howlin' For You" by Black Keys and "Elephant" by Tale Impala, my favorite however is "Open Road" by Delta Thieves.
Same goes for the classical station, which contains many of the most legendary compositions from Mozart, Beethoven, Bach, Tchaikovsky and Wagner. In competition with Timeless FM from FH4, I'm not sure which one is better, but in both games the classical station is the one I listen to the most.
Also the "BPM" (EDM) station (which also has some indie pop tunes) tops Horizon Bass Arena, since here the only song I don't like is "Badman", while most of the rest is very groovy in here, even the Martin Garrix song. My favorite is perhaps "Playing Games".
Same thing however can't be said about the Latin station, which too has some darn catchy songs, and most of it is less bad than English pop music, but nevertheless there's too much autotune in here and some songs are really annoying. And the hip hop one... good for what it is, but I don't like rap at all. Also "Wildstep"... sorry, but most of the songs here would fit either into the hip hop or the BPM station. I think overall the playlist is irrelevant.
However, the "Ambient" station is way better. It isn't really ambient, rather with trip hop and soft indie pop music, but nevertheless here too the selection is pretty soothing and perfect for a ride at night. It definitely is one of the better playlists.
And last but not least the country music station. I honestly was sceptical when I read of this because most of the country music on the radio is pretty boring. Here however you'll hear a mix of swamp, gothic and alternative country from artists like Blues Saraceno and Ouimette. It is perhaps the coolest playlist (along with the rock one), even though I wish it was longer.
Overall there's something there for everybody, and really shows that in every cars TC2 is a synonyme for variety.
Bonus missions:
there are other missions outside the main races too, such as shooting photos and breaking a time record on a certain track. I'm glad this game offers such things, because why they may not be as exciting as Forza Horizon 4, they still do their job and show that Ubisoft care about their fans.
Overall I can say that despite all its flaw, I love The Crew 2, and I believe Ubisoft have done an extremely good job and made a game that I'll be playing for a long time because it has just so much replay value. Now I don't give particular ratings to a game, and I won't do this time either, but I just call it "a game that should be lots of fun to every true racing fan, and to others too". If you can't appreciate it, then well, we don't all have the same tastes lol.
